RGS-IBG Small Research Grants
Awards of up to £3,500 to early career researchers for original desk or field-based research in any area of geography.
About the Award
Each year several grants of up to £3,500 are given to early career researcher individuals (up to 10 years post PhD). One grant of up to £3,500 will be awarded from the 20th International Geographical Congress Fund. The Jasmin Leila Award and the Rob Potter Award will be given as a supplement to projects supported under the scheme, or as independent awards.
Applicants are expected to hold a PhD at the time of applying, must be affiliated with a UK Higher Education Institution and must be Fellows or Members of the Society. These awards are only available to individuals. At risk academic geographers hosted at UK institutions through programmes such as Cara are eligible to apply.
Deadline: 3 February
Apply now
All prospective grant applicants are encouraged to read our Advice and Resources pages, which include more information about the grants programme, its conditions, how to apply for a grant and what is expected if your application is successful. Please read this information carefully and send your application, or any enquiries, by email to grants@rgs.org.
Previous recipients
2023
Dr Alessandro Boussalem (University of St Andrews). 'Italian-Maghrebi: identity, race and place in Milan'
Dr Rachel Carr (Newcastle University). 'Assessing Glacier Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) hazard and risk in the Himalayan water towers'
Dr Joanna Kocsis (Newcastle University). 'Neighbourhood (Geo)Politics: Interactions between global and local factors affecting youth resistance in Latin America'
Dr Samuel Mitchell (University of Bristol). 'Ash in the Agean: impact of marine volcanoes on ecosystem and agriculture'
Dr Andrew Papworth (University of York). 'Land grabs on the Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua: challenges and solutions for the Rama indigenous group'
Dr Xuerong Sun (University of Exeter). '3D Phytoplankton Models'
Dr Nina Willment (University of York). ‘Inked Up, Marked Out’: Exploring the body as a fieldsite'
2022
Dr Alex Hastie (Coventry University). 'The digital geographies of film and cinema: access, algorithm, and interface'
Dr Samuel Berlin (University of Plymouth). 'Atmospheres of (counter)terrorism in European cities'
Dr Adrián Oyaneder (University of Exeter). 'Northern Chile's Chaku and Caycu the highest altitude desert kites in the world'
Dr James Riding (Newcastle University). 'Places where memories reside: exploring memories of war in sites of conscience'
Dr Amy Barron (University of Manchester). 'Approaching middle age through non-representational theories'
Dr Rebecca Senior (Durham University). 'Investigating the microclimate niche of threatened Omani plant species in the Western Hajar Mountains'
2021
Dr Maddy Thompson (Keele University). 'Space of ADHD: a study into women with ADHD'
Dr Alistair Anderson (University of Nottingham). 'Investigating the Geography of Antibiotic- and Vaccine-related Attitudes in Britain'
Dr Adrian Dye (University of York). 'Glacier Response to Extreme Temperature Events in the Arctic'
Dr Mark Holton (University of Plymouth). 'Encountering coastal youth citizenship'
Dr Stephanie Denning (Coventry University). 'The rise of Christian social franchises: responding to UK poverty'
Dr Martin Zebracki (University of Leeds). 'RESOURCE: Re-writing Spaces of Injustice under Radical Social Change'
2020
Dr Jake Hodder (University of Nottingham). 'Internationalising race: the League of Nations and the struggle for racial equality, 1919-1939'
Dr Jenni Sherriff (Royal Holloway University of London). 'A preliminary environmental framework for Early Pleistocene hominin expansion in the Southern Caucasus'
Dr Lorena Gazzotti (University of Cambridge). 'Containment beyond deportation. Governing migrant children in the Spanish enclave of Melilla'
Dr Matthew Tillotson (University of Leicester). 'Telegraphic borderlands. Wires, time and longitude in British imperial boundary'
Dr Tory Milner (University of Huddersfield). 'Colonisation of terrestrial vegetation in an intermittent river: diversity responses to increased drying'
Dr Wiesam Essa (University of Manchester). 'Influence of the impervious surface intensity change on land surface temperature: Case study of the Gaza Strip'
2019
Dr Christopher Darvill (University of Manchester). 'Geomorphic history of the Falklands stone runs'
Dr Ruth Slatter (University of Hull). 'Spaces of nineteenth-century congregational faith: James Smetham (1821-1889) and Methodism in Stoke Newington'
Dr Neil Simcock (Liverpool John Moores University). 'Energy poverty in the private-rented sector: exploring the drivers of vulnerability via the lived-experiences of tenants'
Dr Amber Martin-Woodhead (Coventry University). 'Making space: the geographies of minimalist practices and sustainable consumption'
Dr Anna Bourne (Queen Mary University of London). 'Creating a chronological framework for linking climate, environmental change and human colonisation of the South Pacific'
Dr Nicholas Girkin (University of Nottingham). 'Hot peat: assessing the temperature sensitivity of tropical peat greenhouse gas fluxes and decomposition'
Dr Elizabeth Hurrell (University of Central Lancashire). 'Understanding and evaluating the sedimentary DNA signal from lakes'
2018
Dr Nick Cutler (Newcastle University). ‘Tephra transformations: decoding the record of past volcanic eruptions’
Dr Antonia Law (Keele University). ‘What can contemporary proglacial lakes tell us about the early stages of Holocene lake ontogeny?’
Dr Alessa Geiger (University of Glasgow). ‘A multi-method approach to constrain Patagonian ice sheet geometry along its Pacific margin during the last glacial period’
Dr Nadia Von Benzon (Lancaster University). ‘Rural spaces of youth reform: agricultural landscapes of punishment and citizenship 1850-1967’
Dr Kim Ward (University of Plymouth). ‘Sowing the seeds of heritage: examining the preservation of bio-cultural heritage through the development of community seed-saving initiatives in conflict-affected zones’
Dr Rebecca Collins (University College London). ‘Growing up green: young adults’ everyday sustainabilities after ten+ years of Ashton Hayes’s ‘Going Carbon Neutral’ project’
Dr Sophie Cranston (Loughborough University). ‘“Invisible” international students: British migrant children attending UK universities’
2017
Dr Daniel Schillereff (King's College London). 'Quantifying long-term natural and anthropogenic phosphorus fluxes using Holocene lake sediment profiles from southwest Norway'
Dr Matthew Baddock (Loughborough University). 'Constraining dust emissions from a globally significant dust source'
Dr Rachel Carr (Newcastle University). 'Evaluating the interaction between ice loss and surface debris characteristics on Annapurna South Glacier, Nepal'
Dr Suzanne Beech (Ulster University). 'Experiencing the international higher education recruitment fair: the role of geography in selling a UK higher education'
Dr Colin Lorne (University of Manchester). 'Spatial politics and the English NHS: examining how global policy mobilties shape local healthcare reform'
Dr Charlotte Veal (University of Southampton). 'Choreographing military bodies: aeromobilities, embodied geopolitics, and dance-based combat training with the British Parachute Regiment' (Jasmin Leila Award)
2016
Dr Aga Nowak (University of Sheffield). 'Investigation of the export of glacially derived carbon to downstream terrestrial and marine environments of the High Artic'
Dr Tom Holt (Aberystwyth University). 'The influence of glacier structure, reflectivity and surface temperature on turbulent energy fluxes'
Dr Tom Bradwell (University of Stirling). 'Does lichenometry really work? Evaluating growth-rate variability in yellow-green Rhizocarpon linchens'
Dr Philipp Horn (Open University). 'Peri-urban land management: Integrating indigenous rights and a human rights-based approach in La Paz, Bolivia' (20 IGC)
Dr George Adamson (King's College London). 'El Niño-Southern Oscillation and geographies of knowledge'
Dr Lucy Jackson (University of Liverpool). 'Bodies that travel and the mobile state: state sovereignty and control of fleshy politics'
2015
Dr Rachel Carr (University of Newcastle). 'Evaluating the impact of a proglacial lake and debris cover on ice loss from Russell Glacier, west Greenland'
Dr Amy Donovan (University of Cambridge). 'Science diplomacy in North Korea' (20 IGC)
Dr Lorenza Fontana (University of Sheffield). 'Indigenous voices: assessing the impact of ‘Free, Prior and Informed Consultations’ among Amazon’s communities' (20 IGC)
Dr Andrew Hardy (University of Aberystwyth). 'Mapping malaria breeding habitats using low cost UAVs'
Dr Naho Mirumachi (King's College London). 'Investigating the link between water, conflict and security'
Dr Lizzie Richardson (University of Cambridge). 'Creative workplaces: the changing geographies of self-employment in the UK'
Dr Allan Watson (Staffordshire University). 'Knowledge sharing and networking in regionally-scaled creative economies: the economic geography of north west England’s musical economy' (Jasmin Leila Award)